A neglectful Perthshire farmer has been handed a 10-year animal ownership ban.
Landowner Iain Grindlay exposed pigs and cattle to horrendous conditions at two ramshackle steadings near Aberfeldy.
The livestock was forced to live alongside commercial waste, broken down vehicles and the corpses of other animals.
The 79-year-old, who has since retired from farming, appeared at Perth Sheriff Court for sentencing, having pled guilty to animal neglect charges.
Sheriff Mark O’Hanlon fined him £3,205 and imposed a decade-long disqualification order.
Failed to protect animals from harm
Grindlay, who once had a run-in with a neighbouring eco-cult, admitted failing to take reasonable steps to ensure the needs of his animals were met at his 35-acre home Tomdarroch Farm, near Fearnan, and at Lower Duallin Farm, Lawers.
Court papers state that between March 1 and 22 2022, he failed to provide adequate care and treatment for his pigs.
He did not provide them with a suitable environment and the pigs – “now deceased” according to the charge sheet – were exposed to items of domestic and commercial waste, as well as carcasses of dead pigs and cattle.
Grindlay, further, did not give his pigs adequate shelter, sanitary conditions or proper nutrition.
He admitted failing to protect them from suffering, injury or disease.
The court heard the farmer also failed to give cows at Lower Duallin Farm proper care and treatment by failing to provide them with adequate nutrition during the same period.
The animals were taken into care after an investigation supported by the government’s Animal and Plant Health Agency.
Prosecutor Stuart Hamilton described Tomdarroch, where Grindlay stays in a static caravan, as “strewn with vast amounts of scrap, alongside derelict caravans and vehicles.”
He said: “The farm is made up of the metal frame of a shed.
“There is no shelter to provide any form of housing for his animals.”
The fiscal depute said the units on the farm were in a state of “extreme disrepair”.
Dispute with neighbouring eco-cult
Grindlay admitted a similar charge of exposing pigs to machinery and scrap metal in 2016.
He was admonished after he agreed to hand over his firearms licence to Police Scotland.
In 2012, Grindlay lost a £100,000 legal battle with his neighbour and was ordered to get off land belonging to Margaretha Verkaik, who ran an eco-cult and called herself the Reverend Mother.
The dispute, which ran for almost a decade, began shortly after Ms Verkaik and her husband bought Boreland Farm near Aberfeldy in 2001.
She agreed to let Grindlay’s cattle graze on part of her land and in return, he carried out odd jobs.
But when the cattle began grazing on other parts of the land, Grindlay refused to remove them.
The court was told several clashes took place between the pig farmer and visitors who arrived for alternative lifestyle holidays at the eco-centre.
At one point, Grindlay was said to have driven a herd of rampaging cattle towards members of the eco-cult.
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